Saturday 20 February 2010

Nha Trang and Da Lat


I cannot really say much about Nha Trang. The bus there was absolutely dreadful. Nothing like the one between Hanoi and Hue. It certainly didn't help that I was beginning to feel really ill and ended up throwing up as soon as we arrived. Were taxied to our hotel and I spend pretty much the whole day in my room. By the evening I was still no better so the lady at the front desk called a doctor for me and I had to go to a Vietnamese clinic. Not very nice but the doctor spoke good English and they were very good with me. I was very dehydrated so they stuck me on a drip - the most old-fashioned one I've ever seen! They ran some tests, including an ultrasound that was very bizarre and finally gave me some antibiotics. Heh fun times. The final verdict? Seriously bad food poisoning (something had got into my blood or something like that) >< Spent most of the next day running around sorting out insurance and my bus to Da Lat but I did make it onto the beach that afternoon for an hour or so just to relax. The boys moved hotel as our one was so far out of the centre it was ridiculous and they are staying in Nha Trang for Tet (New Year). There was no point me moving so I spent the evening with them before saying our goodbyes. My only impression of Nha Trang is as a beach resort. It's lovely, but it could be anywhere in the world. There was nothing particularly Vietnamese about it, even the food.

The next morning I caught the bus to the mountain town of Da Lat. The two British girls - Helen and Charlie - who I biked to Hoi An with were on the same bus which was a surprise! The bus broke down a couple of times and the road up the mountains was dreadful. Looks like they're trying to redo it but so far have only achieved in digging it up. We finally arrived in Da Lat to find the huge lake that's on all the photos was dried up! They dropped us off outside a fairly expensive hotel so Helen, Charlie and I grabbed our bags and walked into town. Despite warnings we wouldn't find anywhere (or at least, anywhere cheap) because of Tet we found a lovely little hotel that did us a three-person room for $9 a night. We went for lunch in the 'Peace Cafe' and met a guy on a motorbike who worked for the Da Lat EasyRiders. You get 'easyriders' everywhere but these guys are apparently the real ones. They had some very good recommendations so we agreed to do a day tour with them tomorrow. We took a walk to the market which was absolutely crazy and tried some aloe vera sweets (very odd). We walked back to the hotel via a lovely temple. We were the only ones there and just wandered about almost into the monks quarters! But they were very friendly. Tried to find food that evening and ended up at Tu Anh's restaurant, run by the craziest Vietnamese woman I've ever met. She was wonderful and so so funny. The food was also really delicious - chicken with cooked mango and rice.

The next day we met up with our EasyRider guides and jumped on the back of their bikes for a tour of the area surrounding Da Lat. Our first stop was at a gorgeous Buddhist temple, apparently the oldest pagoda in Da Lat. It had the most enormous dragon statue I've ever seen! My guide, Trung, had spent three years living in a pagoda so he gave us a Buddhist philosophy lesson! It felt like being back at school as he kept asking us questions, but it was incredibly interesting. Throughout the day he kept calling us girls the 'three princesses' and was very very flirty (which did begin to get a bit annoying). We also visited a flower farm, a coffee plantation and a rice wine making factory. They had us taste a little of the 65% proof stuff - it came out of what looked like a plastic jerry can! Our next stop was at Elephant waterfall which was amazing. Quite a difficult way down to it but was really worth it. Stood behind the water and had a nice shower :D After a look around another temple we had lunch with the guides and they ordered us some of the local foods. They also had us try some snake wine and I really wish they hadn't shown us the bottle first. It was a huge glass jar with at least three dead snakes curled up in it. I'm sure there were bits of dead snake floating in my glass so I only had the smallest sip but it was quite enough. Ew! Did not taste good at all, but at least the food was yummy. In the afternoon we went to a silk factory and an orchid farm before visiting the 'Crazy House'. It is almost impossible to describe this place in words - an Alice-in-Wonderland style tree house that could have easily belonged in Disneyland, albeit a Disneyland without health-and-safety! You could climb almost anywhere and some of the walkways were incredibly narrow, high up and with 'barriers' that only came up to mid-calf! Some of the stairs in the bedrooms were almost as bad - just high stepping stones. Mad, but it operates as a hotel so you can actually stay there in any of the ten themed rooms! We got back to the hotel at around 4pm exhausted but happy. All of the guides were lovely, very friendly, knowlegable and spoke fantastic English. Was definitely worth it. Ended back at Tu Anh's that evening as we couldn't find anywhere else and the meal was as hilarious and yummy as before. This time I tried the pineapple chicken and we tried her apple crumble. She was so proud of it and it was really good.

We left the next morning - the girls to Mui Ne and me to Saigon.

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